Torture by Toddler
by VILYA74
Summary: Who was behind all those incidents in Imladris? Legolas is protesting his innocence, but are those blue eyes hiding something? Could it be Aragorn, the future king? Can they endure their punishment? After all, the Elf with the Eyebrows of Doom designed it
1. Default Chapter

TORTURE BY TODDLER  
  
By Vilya74  
  
Disclaimer: I still have not successfully negotiated the rights to any of Tolkien's characters (although it is just a matter of time, really), so I'm just borrowing them for my own pleasure, and hopefully yours. I will try to return them with only such wear and tear as may be reasonable under the circumstances. Of course, I will determine the circumstances (mwahaha [evil laugh and such]).  
  
Thank you to everyone who reviewed Mischief. I have been planning to write a sequel ever since, but it is only now taking shape. I am also working on Fair Folk and Redemption at this time, so please bear with me if I do not post as often as I would like.  
  
Summary: Who was behind all those incidents in Imladris? Legolas is protesting his innocence, but are those blue eyes hiding something? Could it be Aragorn, the future king? And will they be able to endure their punishment? After all, it was designed by the Elf of the Eyebrows of Dooooooom.  
  
Chapter I: The Council of Elrond  
  
Of course, it all began when they innocently came upon Lord Elrond, trussed up in a tree, early one morning. And it should have ended there, but Fate, or something akin to it, had Other Ideas.  
  
*******  
  
"Prince Legolas, the Council will hear you now." The words were like death sentences in themselves, and the Prince who had faced thousands of Orcs in his life without fear in his heart, now could not stop the trepidation that knotted his stomach and made his hands sweat. His only consolation was found in the anxious look on his friend's face. At least he would not face whatever punishment lay in store for him alone. And it would serve Aragorn right if he should suffer twice as much. After all, the whole thing was his idea.  
  
"Legolas Thranduillion, crown prince of Mirkwood, how do you plead?" Lord Elrond's voice boomed across the hall, and Legolas felt certain that the acoustics had been designed to make any accused feel small and insignificant.  
  
"N't g'lty, M'lor," mumbled Legolas, eyes downcast.  
  
"Speak up when you address the Council!" This time it was Lord Glorfindel whose voice thundered over Legolas' head. He had to clear his throat twice before he could say clearly:  
  
"Not guilty, My Lord."  
  
A long silence followed his words, and then everyone on the Council started talking at once.  
  
"Silence!" The single word from Lord Elrond brought order to the proceedings. "Do you deny that the suffering which befell half this Council came about as a direct result of your actions?"  
  
"Well, it wasn't entirely our fault, we only ..."  
  
"Did you, or did you not initiate the course of events that lead to the incident that took place last Friday?" Lord Elrond's eyebrows, newly grown, raised alarmingly.  
  
"Well, actually..." Legolas still valiantly tried to deny full culpability.  
  
"YES or NO, Prince Legolas?" The eyebrows had now hit the roof, and Legolas knew better than to tempt fate any further.  
  
"Yes, my Lord," he said with his head bowed. Perhaps the Council would go easier on him if he looked suitably repentant.  
  
"Do you have anything to say in your own defense?"  
  
His thoughts were in turmoil. Where could he start, and how much could he reveal without causing further embarrassment. He had gone over the events of the last few months a thousand times, but still he could not explain it all. He sighed and decided to look his doom straight in the face.  
  
"No my Lord. Only that we never meant to cause harm to anyone and did not foresee this outcome. I am truly sorry for the hurt we caused and will accept the ruling of this Council." Sincerity exuded from every pore and no elf maid could have looked more innocent and virtuous at that moment.  
  
Lord Elrond seemed unimpressed by this show of guileless rectitude. "Very well. You will hear the Council's verdict tomorrow at noon. In the mean time you will be confined to your quarters. Is that understood?"  
  
"Yes, my Lord." Relieved to be dismissed from the chamber, Legolas could not dispel the feeling of dread.  
  
Walking back to his chambers, where he knew Aragorn would shortly join him, he allowed his memories to take him back to the day his friend had made the oh-so-innocent-sounding suggestion. He grimaces as he recalls his enthusiastic response. No use pretending it was Aragorn who dumped him in this mess. He sighs and shakes his head mournfully. If only...  
  
tbc 


	2. The Idea

"Legolas, I have an idea." Aragorn was lying on his back, staring at the pictures in the clouds and sucking on a blade of grass. It was that kind of day. The sort of lazy summer's day when doing anything other than nothing seems a waste of a perfect day.  
  
"Well there's something new. You don't get those often, do you?" Legolas was propped against a tree with his eyes half-lidded. The gentle teasing was just about all the effort he was prepared to expend at the moment.  
  
"Hmm, that's just because you are unable to spot original ideas, let alone realise when others have them."  
  
"Hilarious, Aragorn, your wit is truly a breath of fresh air in this scholarly place."  
  
"So do you want to hear the idea, or not?"  
  
In hindsight Legolas thought that his thumbs should have pricked. The birds and cicadas should have fallen silent. Nature itself should have cried a warning, but no foreboding did he feel, and no omen came to him to caution against the counsel of the ranger.  
  
"I'm sure you're going to tell me anyway." A small pebble hit him in the ribs, but then Aragorn began to speak: "It has been weeks since we found Ada in the tree. I've been keeping a close eye on both him and Glorfindel, and I know you have been doing the same. I have seen no indication of retribution by Lord Elrond, have you?"  
  
"No, but I'm sure he is just biding his time. Glorfindel has become very jumpy, did you notice?" asked Legolas.  
  
"You mean like when you accidentally dropped that teacup behind him? Father is pretty upset about that cup, by the way," grinned Aragorn.  
  
Legolas looked smug, rather than repentant: "It was worth it though, was it not? I don't think I have seen anyone jump that high since the time Elladan dropped that housesnake down the back of you tunic."  
  
"You would also have jumped around if you had had nightmares about a huge killer snake not hours before," Aragorn grumbled. He had still not forgiven his brother for that particular prank. It would not have been half as bad if it was not for the fact that Arwen just happened to walk in on the scene. He would have felt less embarrassed if he knew that Arwen's appearance had been no accident. Nor was the fact that she wore a brooch bearing a snake motif for the next few days, the sight of which caused Aragorn to blush and stutter whenever he tried to speak to the beautiful Elf. Legolas almost took pity on him, and would have told his friend that the whole thing had been Arwen's idea, if she had not also decided that the joke had gone on long enough, and stopped wearing the brooch.  
  
"Anyway, the point is that I think we should stir things up a little," Aragorn continued his interrupted speech.  
  
"How?"  
  
"By playing a prank on Glorfindel in such a way that we will not be suspected."  
  
"You mean frame your father?"  
  
"Well, I wouldn't go that far. We will leave the conclusions to Glorfindel. That way they can't say we tried to place the blame on Father. It's not our fault if he has a suspicious mind."  
  
Legolas sat up straighter as the idea began to appeal to him. Once the ball was set in motion all they would have to do was watch it passing between the players. It could certainly prove interesting.  
  
"So, what do you have in mind?" 


	3. Blue Fairy

Chapter IV  
  
Blue Fairy  
  
The tall Elf pauses on the threshold of his house before entering. That moment of hesitation had become a habit with him in the last few weeks. It might mean all the difference when Elrond's revenge struck. When, not if. Retaliation was a certainty, but the timing was in Elrond's hands. Elrond, who had been giving him knowing looks and satisfied smiles for the past few days. The uncertainty was killing Glorfindel and he almost wished that he could just get it over with. Little did he suspect that those smiles and looks were all the revenge Elrond intended, having decided that to up the stakes at this stage would not be to his own benefit in the long run.  
  
Nothing. Always nothing. Still wary he enters the house, and begins his second inspection of his house for the day. The first was done immediately upon awakening in the morning. Better safe than sorry.  
  
When he had looked in every nook and cranny and satisfied himself that nothing is amiss, he finally begins to relax a little. He fixes himself a dinner that would go down in the annals of bachelordom as a sad attempt, and sits down to eat his uninspiring fare. With a long day behind him and another to follow, he finally retires. Wearily undressing himself he ponders on the wisdom of going to Elrond and begging his forgiveness for the tree incident. His pride revolts, but the foresight of the elves warn him that this may be the lesser ill to befall him.  
  
With a sigh he throws himself onto his bed, only to rise like the new moon from the ruins of his bed. Still struggling to free himself from the wreckage, he sputters and shakes his head in an attempt to rid him of the blue liquid that covers him from head to toe. A bit more flapping around sees him on his feet and desperately flailing around for a cloth to wipe his face with. His hands come in touch with the closest object to fit this description, and it is only after he can finally see again that he realizes that he had just dried himself off with his favourite robe.  
  
On closer inspection he can see that the wooden base of his bed had been removed and his mattress carefully balanced on a huge bath filled with blue dye. As the space beneath his bed is boarded up on the sides, he had not seen this on his earlier examination of the room.  
  
His already mounting anger reaches volcanic proportions when he surveys the destruction all around: the collapsed bed, the ruined robe, the stained floorboards, al covered with the same blue dye still dripping from his hair. He storms to the front door and throws it open.  
  
"Eeeelrooooooooond!" he thunders across the valley, causing lights to be lit in several houses as startled elven families try to determine the origin of the disturbance.  
  
"Eeeelrooooooooond!" he continues as he strides toward Imladris, leaving behind a blue trail of drops. For days to come the elflings would follow this track and pretend to be on the spoor of a fierce pack of bleeding Orcs. "Eeeelrooooooooond!" he shouts as he shoves an indignant Celboril out of the way just as the latter opens the door to see what has roused him from his well deserved slumber.  
  
"Lord Glorfindel! The Floor!" Celboril screeches as he notices the blotches left on his beautiful polished floor, but the Golden Elf is deaf to his protestations. Only when he reaches the stairs and confronts two elves clinging to each other helplessly in a fit laughter does he stop.  
  
"You think this is funny, do you?! Well, do you?"  
  
"No, of course not my lord," Elrohir valiantly tries to protest, but he is prostrated once more by the giggles that continues to shake his brother.  
  
"You disrespectful young scoundrels! Have your father taught you no manners? I will gladly remedy that oversight. Come back here! Come..." he shouts after the fast retreating twins.  
  
"What is the meaning of this, Glorfindel!?" interrupts the lord of the house from the top of the steps. Even with his nightcap on Elrond manages to glare imperiously down on the intruder.  
  
"That is what I would like to know!" returns said intruder angrily. "My bed is ruined, and so is my clothing, my floor, my dignity! And your two brats have the audacity to laugh at me!"  
  
"Well, if you wake my household in the middle of the night and make a spectacle of yourself, what do you expect?" Elrond answers in his most quelling voice.  
  
"A spect-spectacle!" he stutters in his rage.  
  
"Really, Glorfindel when was the last time you looked in a mirror?" Elrond asks calmly, not betraying the mirth that is silently shaking his frame. He dares not approach Glorfindel for fear of making this obvious to the already incensed elf. The latter stares at him for a moment, too angry to say anything, and then abruptly turns on his heels to march towards the nearest mirror. In shock he stares at the blue monster in his reflection. Blue hair continues to cry blue tears down his nightshirt, which in turns bleeds a blue river wherever he goes. Blue eyes smoulder in a blue face showing signs of turning purple with rage.  
  
"I will get you for this, Elrond. If it's the last thing I do," he bellows before turning and stalking out the door, where a disconsolate Celboril is still bemoaning the state of his no longer gleaming floor.  
  
As he leaves the house, he can swear that he hears someone in the shrubs saying something about a blue fairy before being shushed, but he is too furious to pay heed to any further insults on this night.  
  
tbc 


	4. Eyebrows of Doom

Chapter VI  
  
Eyebrows of Doom  
  
To waylay any suspicion Aragorn and Legolas quickly sneaked back into the house. They emerged bleary eyed from their bedrooms, inquiring what was going on from each other, just as Elrond was coming to see whether they might be the culprits behind the night's events.  
  
"What's going on Ada? I thought I heard Glorfindel," Aragorn asks, while Legolas yawns convincingly enough to produce tears in his sleepy eyes. Lord Elrond stares hard at them for a moment. The scene looks just too innocent, but he can't in good conscience accuse the King of Mirkwood's son of wrongdoing when his own sons are probably at the hub of the matter. The twins had loudly protested their innocence, and if not for Elladan' saying "Though I wish we did think of it", Elrond might not have believed them.  
  
"Someone played a stupid prank on Lord Glorfindel," he says gruffly. Aragorn and Legolas look at each other with wide eyes before bursting out laughing.  
  
"But Ada, I thought you had the prerogative on that," Aragorn manages to say between guffaws.  
  
"Gmf!" is all Elrond replies as he walks off with a slightly worried look on his face. In moments the twins join the laughing friends, and regale them with exaggerated descriptions of Glorfindel's appearance and conduct in between fits of giggles. It is not until Cerboril haughtily informs them that Some People would like their Rest, that a semblance of calm descends upon Imladris.  
  
With the twins on their way to their bedrooms, Legolas and Aragorn lingers for a moment longer in the hallway. Before they part, Legolas whispers to Aragorn: "Well this worked better than we anticipated. I wonder how long we will have to wait for Glorfindel's revenge?" Aragorn answers with a wicked grin before walking of to his room.  
  
They did not have to wait long. A reluctant Celboril was sent to help Glorfindel clean up the mess in the morning, but Elrond's attempt at mollifying the tall elf proved to be in vain.  
  
A tall, dark figure approaches the house stealthily. As he reaches the wall he fires a crossbow bolt upwards. At the apex of its trajectory it just clears the balcony railing. The bolt is attached to a rope, and a sharp pull on that reveals that the bolt doubles as a grappling hook. The tall figure quickly ascends the rope and lithely vaults onto the balcony. He remains there for a moment, senses thrown outwards, listening for any indication that the house's occupants have been roused. When only the cheerful chirping of crickets greet his ears, he proceeds to enter the house through the open window. He only goes a few steps into the room before he stops and takes out a tiny bow and an even tinier little arrow. He carefully aims and fires just as the target opens his eyes, alerted to the other's presence by his keen elven senses. Sitting up abruptly, he grabs at his neck where the tiny arrow has lodged and pulls it from his flesh. Startled by its presence he looks at the hooded figure, which is already beginning to swim before his eyes. "Glorfindel, is that you?" With a sigh he falls back on the bed, the fast acting sedative stealing away panic along with consciousness.  
  
"Yes," the figure hisses, and then approaches the bed purposefully. He stays but a few minutes before he departs as silently as he came.  
  
Morning sees Elrond at the breakfast table being less than his usual sociable self. He had awakened with a terrible headache and a distinct feeling that there was something he should recall. He had overslept and as a result had only thrown on his dressing gown and pulled a quick brush through his hair. Even so he still beat the younger ones to the table.  
  
No one in the Imladris household is at their best this early in the morning. A grumbled 'morning' is the best anyone can expect from his companions until at least halfway through the meal. It is at this time, when Elrohir finally lifts his sleep-puffed eyes from his plate, that he encounters a terrible sight.  
  
"Ada!" he exclaims appalled. His shout startles his twin, who consequently knocks over a jug filled with fruit juice just as Celboril enters the room with another dish.  
  
"Oh, you clumsy young ones. Can't you do anything without making a mess?" he continues to mutter imprecations as he cleans up the table and the floor. In the mean time Elladan has seen what his brother is staring at, and tries to choke back the laughter. Aragorn and Legolas look at them questioning.  
  
"What?" Aragorn asks his older brother.  
  
"Hmm, Strider, eh..." Legolas falters.  
  
Elrond looks at them with suspicion. "What now?" he demands, frowning. Unconsciously he scratches his brow, and this sets Elladan off, soon to be followed by his two brothers. Legolas tries to retain his dignity by looking away and hiding his grin. By now Elrond's temper has risen to dangerous levels as he again demands to know what is going on from his sons. Seeing that he would find no answer there, he turns to Celboril, who is still muttering and grumbling to himself as he wipes the floor. "Celboril, what are these clowns laughing at? Have I grown a second nose?"  
  
Celboril looks up and stares at his lord for a moment. "Well?" Elrond demands again.  
  
"Hmm, my Lord, you seem to be missing your eyebrows. Hmm, and some of your hair."  
  
"WHAT!" Elrond thunders, jumps from his seat and rushes out the room to the nearest mirror, knocking a plate of scrambled eggs off the table in the process.  
  
The mirror is the same one Glorfindel used not two days ago, and again it reflects a shocked and wrathful elf. He leans closer and fingers his face gingerly where his eyebrows have been carefully shaved off. Well a few weeks should take care of that, but his hair! His beautiful tresses look as if a mouse with a hair fetish had attacked him. Several mice, in fact. He draws a deep breath to calm himself before walking haughtily back to the dining room where the youngsters are still given over to their mirth.  
  
"Enough of that, your food is growing cold. Eat," Elrond orders them, and continues to do just that as if nothing had occurred. The youngsters join soon him, but throughout the remainder of the meal stifled giggles can be heard from the twins, and the other two desperately tries to avoid each other's eyes. 


End file.
